Want Pakistan, India to resolve differences through international relations: US

WASHINGTON: White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest during a briefing on Friday said that the United States has “long urged India and Pakistan to find ways to resolve their differences not through violence but through diplomacy.”

Pakistan and India have “made some important progress in that pursuit, and we’re hopeful that they’ll be able to continue to make the kind of progress that will bring greater stability to what is a rather volatile region of the world,” Earnest said.

The White House statement comes as Pakistan and India are engaged in a heated war of words at the United Nations General Assembly over Kashmir, days after India accused Pakistan of involvement in a militant attack at an army base in Uri, India-held Kashmir.

Although Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in his UNGA address maintained that Pakistan wants peace with India but it is “not possible without resolving the Kashmir issue”. The premier urged the UN to demilitarise Jammu and Kashmir and called for steps to implement UN Security Council resolutions on Kashmir.

Indian premier Narendra Modi, in his first speech since the Uri attack, said India would “work” to isolate Pakistan.

The Indian PM accused Pakistan of instigating terror attacks in Bangladesh and Afghanistan, and of trying to destabilise India by exporting terrorism. In the same breath, Modi challenged Pakistan to “fight a war on poverty and unemployment and see who wins first, India or Pakistan.”